Promise
by anbu-kakkashi
Summary: It's been five years since Chihiro came back from her stay in the spirit world and she hasn't seen Haku since. Please read, I don't really know how to summarize the story.


**So this is my first Spirited Away fanfic.**

**It's also a one-shot about my views on what happened after Chihiro left the spirit world.**

**I don't know if people really write fanfics for Ghibli films but here's mine.**

**Enjoy!**

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"Ogino Chihiro."

Raising her right hand, Chihiro sighed and called, "Here."

Five years.

Staring out the window, she drowned out the teacher's voice and thought of all that had happened in those three eventful days.

Five years.

Even today, she was wearing the same purple hair-tie that Zeniba had her friends had made for her. Every day when she woke up, the first thing she did was gather her hair up in the back and loop the luminous thread around. Sure, it was starting to fray but she didn't even consider to stop using it. That was all she had left of that world and she sure wasn't going to let go of it.

Or was it time to?

Five years she waited. Five years, she held onto the promise of seeing him again.

But he never came.

Haku, the boy who had saved her life as a child and again five years ago along with her parents, hadn't kept his promise.

After her sojourn in the spirit world, she waited faithfully every single day.

For five whole years.

Naturally, she made some new friends. Haku had always wanted her to be happy so she tried as hard as she could to be happy.

But for some reason, without him, it seemed nearly impossible.

During the first year, everything seemed to be fine. She had looked forward to the possibility of seeing Haku in the near future and patiently waited, spending her time between school and thinking of the spirit world. She thought of the good times, the bad. But mostly of Haku.

During the first year, she kept by.

In the second year, she was getting a little impatient but decided to wait. Besides, he had never said when they would meet again, had he? But he did mean sometime in the near future, didn't he? She wanted to talk to her friends about him, about how much of a wonderful person he was. But they didn't know about the spirit world or anyone from it.

In the second year, she kept waiting.

On the third year, some creep at school assaulted her. It was sort of expected. She was told to not go to that one party but had she listened? No. She was just a small, freshman girl up against a perverted senior. But who said that if it was expected, that she liked it? She thought about how if Haku had been there, he would've been able to stop the freak before he violated her. If.

On the third year, she blocked everyone else out.

Throughout the fourth year, she self-harmed. She didn't even know the reason why. The creep who had raped her had been jailed. She had plenty of friends, who stood by her, and gave her support when she needed it. She didn't see the problem. She just… felt it. Deep inside, the unknown force clawing away and at her and leaving thin, red scars on her arms.

Throughout the fourth year, she suffered.

And now, with the fifth year almost coming to an end, she was ostracized. The friends that were formally with her were now against her. They got tired of her, she assumed. Well, what would they have understood? They were never held against their own will. They never waited for someone for five full years. They've never gone through anything that she had.

All through the fifth year, she contemplated suicide.

By then, the red scars had already gone past her arms and down to her thighs, where at least her uniform skirt covered. But people had already seen the marks on her arms, thanks to the hot weather of the Japanese summer. Even her parents had seen them and hadn't done anything about it.

She had never wanted to think about her parent's deaths. It was during the fourth year, right after they had seen the scars. It wasn't that they didn't want to do anything about them. It was that they couldn't. They had both died in a car accident after driving back home from a friend's house.

She… truly was lonely.

Through her reverie, she heard the faint noise of the bell ringing and automatically stood up when her classmates started to do so. Picking up her bag, she stuffed everything she had out back inside and slung one strap over her shoulder, strolling out of the door as she did so.

Walking to her locker, she got everything that she needed and headed back home. She didn't like taking the bus like the other kids as much, even if it meant about thirty minutes of walking. Besides, the weather was nice and she figured that she would have to enjoy it as much as she could before she was gone.

Gone.

She never really thought that when she killed herself, that she would no longer be. She would no longer be able to see, hear, or touch anything. She had always wondered where she would go after she did it. Maybe the spirit world? Then she'd be able to see Haku. But what if it wasn't even there that she would got to? She'd disappear into oblivion, never to be able to think ever again. She'd just be… gone.

Walking along the bleach, she listened to the repeated sound of the waves lapping up at the shore. She'd always liked ocean. It calmed her. When everything seemed like they were falling apart, the ocean had always helped her to think straight.

She was hoping that it would happen again. That the waves would tell her to rethink everything before she took her own life with their soft murmurs. That the ocean would always be there for her. The thought made her laugh. It had always been there throughout time, hadn't it?

Dropping her bag to the sand, she sat down and stared out at the wide, blue expanse. She had been right. The ocean _did_ calm her down. Or so she thought it did. If it was supposed to calm her, why did she still have this heavy feeling in her chest, and why did her throat constrict so much to the point she couldn't hold it in any longer?

She couldn't hold them back. The hot, wet, messes that flowed from her eyes and into her skirt. Gripping sand tight in her hand, she beat her head, trying to get all the thoughts that came through to stop. She didn't want to think anymore, she didn't want to feel anything! And yet, _why_ was she still crying? She was supposed to have gotten over this long ago, the fact that she hadn't seen Haku once in five years, the fact that she was all alone. She was supposed to have gotten over everything! She was supposed to have been an empty shell, going through the routines of life until she ended it herself.

"What's wrong with me?" She screamed, clutching at her hair, making the brown strands fly out of her ponytail-holder. "What. The. Fucking. Hell. Is wrong with me?"

"_Chihiro_."

Her eyes widened, surprised at hearing her name being called in the first time in a really long time. No, she was just imagining it. There was no way that someone would actually talk to her.

"Look at me."

Turning her head ever so slightly, she let out a shaky breath as she saw who was beside her.

"Ha... ku…?"

There was no mistaking it. She would never miss his calm, piercing gaze that was now filled with worry. His chin-length hair now cut short with his bangs sweeping to the side. Surprisingly, he was dressed in normal jeans and a black hoodie, not the bathhouse uniform that he wore in the spirit world.

"Is that really you?"

He nodded, concern clearly shown on his face. He knew that she would've been waiting for him for a while, but he didn't know that she'd be in such a poor condition. He never really meant for her to wait so long, it was just that he had matters to attend to in the spirit world and he got caught up with the time…

Staring down at her tear-streaked face, he didn't know what to say for a moment. How could he sum up five years' worth of pain for her?

"I'm… sorry."

She froze, and he expected her to say something back. To his surprise, she started screaming again.

"No! Don't start that with me! I'm done with everyone telling that they're sorry, and then leaving me! All my friends did that, now they're nothing but strangers to me! Even my parents, they- they left…" She gripped her hair tightly and hunched her shoulders. "Everyone left."

She gasped as she felt a pair of warm and strong arms wrap around her and pull her closer to him. Gently prying her arms away from her head, he traced the numerous lines on her arms. "You didn't have to do this, you know."

She wiped her eyes and sniffed, suddenly feeling very conscious about her scars. Nobody had really talked to her about them; Haku was the first to address the issue.

Furrowing his brows together, he bit his lip and sighed. "I'm so sorry."

She drew in a sharp breath and replied curtly, "Don't."

"But that doesn't mean I'm going to be leaving you." Her eyes widened as he leaned forward and planted a kiss on her forehead. "I'll never leave you alone ever again."

"You did it." She whispered, burying her face in his chest. "You finally kept your promise."

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**:P I feel like the ending sucked.**

**But I couldn't really think of any more ideas.**

**Ok no more excuses from me.**

**Please leave anything you'd like to say about the story in the reviews.**

**I'd love to read them all :D**


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